Jaap van der Meer of TAUS (Translation Automation User Society) says in his recent post about Google Translation Toolkit:
Translators using the Translation Toolkit ‘share’ their translations with Google. If 100,000 translators start using the service, Google will be harvesting 50 billion words of good quality translation data per year to help Google improve their automatic translation engines. In addition translators may be uploading their own (or their customers’) TMs.
Read the ret of the post at the URL below:
Google Translation Toolkit | Technology.
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Thanks for this very interesting link.
I note that the pot (TAUS) is calling the kettle (Google) black.
Does TAUS fear competition? It should not. These are different “segments” of the same market…
I’m no google employee, but for fairnes’ sake: Google does not *sell* translation; they offer a possibility to set up “private” TMs and there’s no indication yet they’d break confidentiality on those. Google is just another way of doing things. I don’t see the point in fear mongering. Bashing the big guys has always been an easy, chic thing to do. So my comment:
> If 100,000 translators start using the service, Google will be harvesting 50 billion words of good quality translation data per year to help Google improve their automatic translation engines.
- excellent.
> In addition translators may be uploading their own (or their customers’) TMs…
..if they /decide/ to. So what. Bear in mind not all translations are for-profit. Countless minority languages, translations for humanitarian or cultural purposes, etc, will find a great help in the Google paradigm. Forget money for a second, Jap.
If anything: get inspiration from them and do your own thing.
- AC